


Reflections in the Dark

by Kolhrafn



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-07
Updated: 2019-07-07
Packaged: 2020-06-24 03:16:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19715143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kolhrafn/pseuds/Kolhrafn
Summary: Shay ponders the events of the last few days.





	Reflections in the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> Contains spoilers for the Shadowbringers main quest line, DO NOT READ if you haven't completed 5.0.
> 
> FFXIV and all associated characters belong to SE.  
> Shay belongs to me.

Shadows.They shrouded the city in a kind of comforting dimness, not veiling the warm light that spilled from the windows of the buildings.  
After the events of the last few days Shay found solace in that comforting gloom. In this place, this memory of Amaurot, nowhere was the light bright enough to cause discomfort.  
She had always hated bright light.  
Yet here, in the Akadaemia, she let the shadows wrap around her like a cloak. Soothing her troubled thoughts and granting her a fleeting moment of peace.  
Some distance ahead a trio of shades spoke in excited tones, the harmonies of their voices trilled as they relived their last day over and over.  
Shay had spoken to them, one of them at least.To her surprise he had told her of Lahabrea; a great researcher, sorcerer, and, apparently, a renowned orator.  
Regret. Lahabrea was gone, struck down by Thorden. She had not wanted that.  
Face an enemy often enough and the mind would play tricks on you. Respect, a strange kind of trust, fondness. Even the taste of his aether had become strangely comforting.  
Taste? Such things had no meaning when she had faced him, it was a sense that was not. Yet it was undeniably _him_. If he were to come before her tomorrow, clothed in unfamiliar flesh, she would still know him.  
Faced with two Ascians it was Igeyorhm she had chosen to slay, content to allow Lahabrea to withdraw.  
"Why didn't you talk to me?" Shay spoke in barely a whisper, "I would have listened."  
Once she had held out hope that her enemy had somehow survived, yet the long years had forced upon her the unpleasant truth that she would never see him again.  
A soft chuckle, silence barely disturbed. "It seems that Emet-Selch was not the only one to be sentimental."  
The claws on her gloves trailed over the stone bench upon which she sat as her mind pictured the face of his vessel. It was not an appealing skin, careworn despite its youth, with luminous eyes that had watched her intently. Yet, even through the glibness and apparent contempt, he had always brightened upon seeing her.  
"Emet-Selch, Hades, who am I to you? Who _was_ I?"  
There was no answer, nor could there be. Only this city of shades and echoes, a moment playing out for eternity.  
While Shay felt saddened by Emet--Selch's death she felt no guilt for killing him, pouring that abhorrent light into him, shattering his very spirit.  
The hooded robes she wore concealed her sad smile, Darklight, the name brought amusement. No, there was no guilt, only regret, yet she would honour the Ascian's last wish.  
_Remember_.  
Was that why she had returned to this shrouded city? To look, learn, and remember?  
Parts of the tale that he had told were already known to her. The battle between Hydaelyn and Zodiark, the sundering of the star, and the fate of the Thirteenth. Shay had also already suspected, strongly suspected, that being one of Hydaelyn's chosen was simply a form of tempering.  
There was no reason to assume that Zodiark's children had any more choice in the matter than she did.  
Emet-Selch had told a truly compelling tale and Shay did not believe that he had lied to her.  
That did not mean that what he had told her was _true_.  
She breathed deeply of the still air, silence broken only by the harmonies of the shades.  
When the Word of the Mother had spoken to her she had told her that, "before there was life, Light and Dark did once dwell as one." Hence were Hydaelyn and her twin in existence long before the Ascians had sought their summoning. Perhaps the very catacylsm that had threatened Amaurot had been the start of Zodiark's struggle with Hydaelyn.  
No, Emet-Selch had not lied. Yet had Hydaelyn?  
A frown. Hydaelyn had been silent for a long time, either not deigning or not able to speak to her Chosen.  
It did not matter, Shay did not trust her.  
How could she trust a Mother who cared not for the suffering of her children? It was true that after Urianger's machinations Hydaelyn had sent her Word to intercede on the First, halting the flood of light and saving those in Norvrandt, but any benevolence in that act came from what was left of Minfillia. Shay was nigh certain Hydaelyn itself was not concerned about those slain and warped in the flood, but only wished to prevent another ardour and Zodiark's restoration.  
She looked down at her hands, glad to see only smooth leather and red metal claws, rather than that light.  
An image flickered in her mind, the shade who had spoken to her in the Bureau of the Secretariat.  
Hythlodaeus.  
Through the forlorn streets and shadowed buildings had Shay searched for him, searched and not found him. The realisation that he must have faded brought only more sorrow.  
He had known her, recognised her spirit as belonging to someone that Emet-Selch had once called friend.  
The Convocation of Fourteen.  
Thirteen Ascians, Overlords at any rate, if each had once overseen a separate shard. Most of them Shay could now name, of those three were slain by her own hand.  
A shiver, brought on not by cold but by uncomfortable revelation.  
"I am the last member of the Convocation of Fourteen."  
Even whispered the words carried an ominous finality. "I am one of them, for we were once comrades."  
That was true. Shay knew that, as Gifted, she had far more in common with the Ascians than with the Scions. Though she was still, apparently, bound to her flesh she knew blade nor claw would not be enough to unmake her. She had heeded Elidibus' lessons well.  
Struck by an arrow or taken by poison, it would not matter. If her flesh were to be damaged beyond repair then she could simply take a new vessel.  
Her body, in truth, did not matter.  
That light! Pure, bright, and agonising, threatening to shatter the part of her that was eternal.  
As she had shattered Igeyorhm and Nabriales, as she had shattered Emet-Selch.  
That was true death, and Shay feared it.  
"I will _not_ be unmade."  
Fury flickered and faded, coldness settled within her.  
That sense of kinship was dangerous, Emet-Selch had proven that. His recognition of her as a friend and companion who had no knowledge of him was what had pushed him to fight.  
In her case it would make her stay her blade until the last possible moment.  
Shay got to her feet, she had all eternity to ponder such mysteries.  
A memory, that last smile before he had faded.  
Emet-Selch's suffering was over, hers stretched out before her.


End file.
